The Final Trawl (song) - Mainsail Café

This song was written in the late 20th century by Archie Fisher, Scottish folk singer and songwriter. It was recorded on his album Windward Away and covered by groups including The Clancy Brothers, Gordon Bok, Mike James, David Coffin, and Archie Fisher's sister Cilla Fisher. Since the 1960s, communities all over the world have faced the collapse of fish populations due to overfishing. Bok's liner notes to The First Fifteen Years, Vol. I, explains the origins of this song:

Archie Fisher said he wrote this song after seeing a couple of perfectly good steel trawlers rusting away on the ledges (skerries) outside a harbor in northern Scotland, and was told by fishermen that they have been drove there by their owners because, even with the government subsidy to help the fishermen, the fishing was so poor they still couldn't make a living, and the men didn't want to see them cut into scrap by the ship-breakers.

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Now it's three long years since we made her pay
Ch: Sing haul away, my laddie O
And we can't get by on the subsidy
Ch: And sing haul away, my laddie O

So it's heave away for the final trawl
It's an easy pull for the catch is small

Now it's stow yer gear, lads, and batten down
Then I'll take the wheel, lads, and turn her round

And we'll join the Venture and the Morning Star
Riding high and empty beyond the bar

For I'd rather beach her on the Skerry Rock
Than to see her torched in the breaker's dock

And it's when I die you can stow me down
In her rusty hold where the breakers sound

Then we'll make the Haven and the Fiddlers Green
Where the grub is good and the bunks are clean

For I fished a lifetime, boy and man
And the final trawl scarcely nets a cran

As sung by Archie Fisher

Metadata

Attribution: Archie Fisher

Fishing song, Hauling shanty, Modern song

Selected recordings:

Victory Sings At Sea Various artists

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